U.S. announces visa restrictions on Russians

President Barack Obama stepped up the pressure on the Ukraine crisis Thursday morning, creating authority for sanctions directly targeted at those the U.S. blames for what’s going on, as well as immediately placing visa restrictions on them.

No individuals have been identified so far, but the administration says it expects to do so if Russia does not remove its troops from Crimea. They are “as of this morning on notice that they may be targeted by U.S. sanctions,” a senior administration official said Thursday.

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The administration expects that both Russian and Ukrainian nationals would be affected.

“We have not listed specific individuals or entities, but this authority is now in place, and we will be looking to use it,” the official said.

The White House says the executive order would hit individuals and entities responsible for undermining the democratic process in Ukraine, those who attempt to threaten the peace and territorial integrity of the country and those misappropriating state funds.

Also included: anyone “purporting to assert governmental authority over any part of Ukraine without authorization from the Ukrainian government in Kyiv.” The State Department has also instituted visa restrictions for that group, including revoking existing visas.

“This should send a strong message that we intend to pursue costs on Russia for this intervention,” a second senior administration official said.

White House officials said earlier in the week that they were considering targeted sanctions and visa restrictions under the president’s executive authority and predicted that these could affect people who could exert pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin. However, they waved off the idea that Putin would be directly affected, saying that individual sanctions against a head of state would constitute a much more severe diplomatic break than they are currently prepared to pursue.

But while the administration has promised lasting costs for Putin’s actions, it seems to be willing to change course on Thursday’s moves if Russia does.

“We can recalibrate our sanctions and our actions based on what the Russians do, and obviously if they were to pull back their troops, that would affect our calculus,” the second official said.

One option would be to add more names to the list under the Magnitsky Act, a law that allows the United States to level various sanctions against Russian citizens suspected of human rights abuses. That possibility is “under active consideration” by the Obama administration, said Eric Rubin, a State Department official who testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday.

The new actions come after Secretary of State John Kerry’s trip to Ukraine on Tuesday to meet with and show support for the interim government and a meeting he had with the Russian foreign minister Wednesday, after which both said they had updates to provide to their presidents. However, in what seemed like a clear expression of the frustration of American officials, after the meeting, the State Department released a list of “fictions” of their claims, writing that “as Russia spins a false narrative to justify its illegal actions in Ukraine, the world has not seen such startling Russian fiction since Dostoyevsky wrote.”

Thursday’s executive order, the White House said, “is a flexible tool that will allow us to sanction those who are most directly involved in destabilizing Ukraine, including the military intervention in Crimea, and does not preclude further steps should the situation deteriorate.”

Officials rejected the idea that they were prompted to move Thursday because of a Crimean parliament call for a status referendum earlier in the day. But they said that referendum would not be acceptable except if done in consultation with the interim Ukrainian government.

“Ultimately, only the people of Ukraine can make decisions about their political future, and the government in Kiev needs to be involved … they have to be at the table,” the second official said. “You can’t have a situation where the legitimate government of a country is excluded from decisions about a part of that country.”

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) praised Thursday’s moves while pushing for further action.

“We welcome this first step but remain committed to working with the administration to give President Obama as many tools as needed to put President Putin in check as well as prevent Russia from infringing on the sovereignty of any of its other neighbors,” said Boehner spokesman Brendan Buck.